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There is another Iran

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is slated to make his annual visit to New York to address the UN on Sept. 23, 2009. If there ever were a time for us Iranian-Americans to come together to demonstrate to the world our outrage and contempt for his government, it is surely now. It is important that we do this especially because the movement to protest election fraud and civil rights abuse in Iran has been brutally suppressed.

The reform movement in Iran is in shackles and behind bars. Armed with the Sepah, Basij and plain-clothes forces the Ahmadinejad government has arrested our leaders, intellectuals, activists and students. Many have been killed, tortured and raped. All publications that reported about and criticized the government and its abusive ways have been shut down. The coup d’état regime has raided offices and party headquarters to get rid of evidence gathered against it.

That is why we, who enjoy freedom outside the motherland, have to stand up and defend our reform and freedom-seeking compatriots. The more they are silenced, the more it is up to us to speak up about their cause, our cause, of freedom and respect for civil liberties in Iran. To show our outrage at what has happened in Iran is our right, indeed our duty. We, who claim to love that land, to love what is good about it, to love her history, her culture, her food, her poetry and her wonderfully diverse people, we need to show our love, not just utter it. We need to go to New York and show the world how many we are. We need to go to New York stand in front of the UN headquarters and show the world that there is another Iran.

There is an Iran who seeks freedom and justice, one who is caring and compassionate, one who rejects Ahmadinejad, Khamenei and the IRGC. We inside and outside Iran are that Iran, the Iran who has no arms, no one holy book, who is not even united under one ideology or religion but an Iran who is compassionate, fair and forward thinking. An Iran who wants to move on. An Iran who wants to move out of the byzantine labyrinth of religious dictatorship, an Iran who wants to send its bright youth to schools and universities where they can learn in peace and freedom. We ARE that Iran and those of us who are outside, who enjoy the freedom that our compatriots inside are systematically denied, need to stand up for that Iran.

We need to stand up for this other Iran that exists in all our hearts. This Iran that, though it may not have physical reality, does have a long history. This fair, kind, friendly and free Iran we have all held inside us for too long. This Iran whose physical manifestation has always been denied us, but whose spiritual presence all of us not only feel but represent. We are those Iranians the world has come to know because of our presence in the four corners of the globe since we started to take refuge from the Islamic Republic at its very inception 30 years ago. Our numbers only keep getting bigger.

We teach in schools and universities, conduct research at global institutions, work at nightclubs and restaurants, drive taxis, run multinational companies and drive kids to soccer practice. Regardless of our backgrounds or our political leanings or religious beliefs we are all hardworking, honest, fair and democratic citizens of the globe. We need to stand by our like-minded brothers, sisters and children crowding the prisons and medieval dungeons of Iran. We need to stand by our compatriots who have been muzzled by fear. We need to show the world and our compatriots in Iran that this other Iran, this Iran of a great people, this Iran whose savage violation everyone just witnessed is not going to remain silent. We have to show that our collective anger can and will bring this regime of hypocrites, liars and murderers to it heels.

We don’t need anyone to bomb us or sanction us into poverty to bring an end to this mess we have gotten ourselves into. We are a great people, an educated hardworking people, and we know how to self-correct. Let's show we know when to unite, how to resist, how to persevere. We need to let the world know that we may not be armed with weapons but we are armed with a solid sense of identity and where we want to go from here. We simply want respect for our humanity, respect for our civil rights. We want freedom of the most basic variety.

Regardless of stripe or political persuasion, we have to stop the bickering and see what we have in common: our hatred of the Ahmadinejad government and our firm belief in respect for civil and human rights. Whether Zionist or pro-Palestinian, Republican or Democrat, socialist or liberal, we have to come together and show our compatriots in Iran and the international community that there is another Iran. We have to show the world, and more importantly ourselves, that there is another Iran, an Iran that is fair and free -- an Iran that lives in every single one of our hearts. An Iran that is waiting to be born.

For the other Iran

The point of no return is not a mass demonstration. It's not clashes with repression forces. It's what is happening inside the hearts and minds. It is not dependent to the repression forces action on taking under control an exit door of a metro station. This has already happened in the hearts and minds. The Islamic regime is not sustainable anymore.

The main reason, actually the only reason, that I started writing after fifteen years of being apolitical, is that I couldn't see any alternative emanating from this new movement. A movement that was structured based on taking over the governance of the Islamic regime, has forcibly and unpredictably changed its nature in the aftermath of the election, without having any structure to serve it. Now the green movement is hoping for the opening of the schools to revive the protests without putting forward a strategic goal for these protests. This is a sign of desperation.

We, as Iranians abroad and enjoying our freedom, if we content to offer our moral support in some demonstrations, we are not doing our duty. Iranians inside the country need us more than ever, not only to show our moral support but also to guide them through their ordeal. This is NOT bickering. It is helping them to fulfill their ultimate goal. To provide a structure that they lack.

The freedom fighters are now instructed by green movement about which street is a two way street and suitable for a larger protest and which street is a one way street and better suited for a spot protest. We, outside the country can not provide the tactical. What we can provide is to set a clear alternative and the organizational structure that is going with it, so that a spot protest in a one way street lead to something.

Otherwise we have already seen the result of the protest of millions and millions of well intentioned people who had it clear in mind about what they didn't want but nothing about what they want.

We will go to New York, with or without flags, with or without signs, but we will go there to show what Iranians are made of. Not necessarily because the green movement invited us. There are those who go for the green movement. But all of us will go there for our new national movement. This is our duty toward our compatriots inside the country.

Ommaties come in all shapes & shades

Some times a few words tell a lot about the person than a whole book written;

"....Whether Zionist or pro-Palestinian...."

So in your vocabulary one is only pro palestinian or he/she must be a zionist ..hehe,good to know..then ,all true patriots hence must be zionists since they follow the path of world,s first Zionist, the beloved Cyrus of Anshan who freed many slaves among em Jews...

We?. who is "we"?.Here you go again like most status quo ideologues pretending to speak on behalf of "We". The first rule of democracy that you preach about is to stop pretending to speak on behalf of others.

other Iran? which Iran are you talking about? the same status quo Iran that has been going on for the last 1400 yrs of ommatestan(yes even to some extent Pahlavis too). Are you realy anti IRI or just a Bani Abbass(Reformist) clan member hating khamenei & Ahmadi ? .Are you proposing Islamic Republic version II minus some original actors?

"...but we are armed with a solid sense of identity and where we want to go .."

We again, ?, please elaborate on what you mean by Iranian identity.Does it include the same bablomania of Palestine this America that, & absolute contempt for true Iran of Kiann?

We don't know how to unite.

Iranians don't know or don't want to know how to unite. We talk the big talk and forget about it. That is part of our culture. We have been trying to unite for 30 years now and nothing. A few corageous ones have given their lives for nothing. We were all Nedas for a week. Why is that? Why can we never unite? I wish I knew the answer.

Ali Pournourbakhsh

Very well said

It is only through unity can we acheive our objectives to have a free Iran that will bring brighter future. This beautiful land has been inflicted with too much brutality, hate and cruelty. I may not be an Iranian, but I feel the pain just the same. Let us all unit for one common cause to end all these injustices brought up by AN and his thugs.